Free Petra Offer at Calvin Attracts Over 10,000 Students

June 15, 2005 == MEDIA ADVISORY

Although some homeschoolers are still taking advantage of the "free Petra"
offer at Calvin College, most of the traffic for public and private school
groups has come to a stop now that the school year is done.

Calvin officials are tallying up the final numbers for the special offer and
say it was an unqualified success.

The most recent report from the Box Office at the Prince Conference Center at
Calvin, where the Petra: Lost City of Stone exhibition is on display from now
through August 15, shows that about 160 schools throughout Michigan took
advantage of the chance to take their students to Petra for free.

The offer began in mid-April when two donors who had seen the exhibition and
been wowed by it pledged money to allow any and all school children to see
Petra for free. As soon as the offer was announced the phones at the Prince
Conference Center started ringing.

Two months later, as school winds down, a total of 5,500 public school
students, 3,400 private school students and 1,400 homeschool students have seen
Petra for free - a total of 10,300 students.

Those students were accompanied by almost 1,700 adults for a total of 12,000
visitors!

Another $12,000 was contributed toward transportation costs for a total bill
for the two donors of $71,000. And they couldn't be happier.

"Both the donors were amazed by the Petra exhibition when they say it," says
Henry DeVries, a vice president at Calvin and a member of the Petra Steering
Committee. "Their goal was to get as many students as possible through the
exhibition by the end of the school year. They felt very strongly that this
was an opportunity that should be denied to no student because of cost. So,
for us to report to them that over 10,000 students saw Petra because of their
generosity was a very pleasant task. They are thrilled that things worked out
the way they did."

Petra: Lost City of Stone is at Calvin until August 15 and features over 200
exceptional objects, including stone sculptures and reliefs, ceramics,
metalwork, architectural elements, terracotta or ancient water pipes, artworks
in various media and other fascinating artifacts. All are on loan from
collections in Jordan and throughout Europe and the United States. Many are on
display in the United States for the first time.

About 30,000 visitors have seen Petra: Lost City of Stone thus far at Calvin
College.

Organized by the American Museum of Natural History and the Cincinnati Art
Museum, and presented under the patronage of Her Majesty Queen Rania
Al-Abdullah of Jordan, Petra is the first major cultural collaboration between
Jordan and the United States. Air transportation generously provided by Royal
Jordanian. A lead local sponsor for Petra is Huntington Bank - West Michigan.

See www.calvin.edu/petra

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Received on Wed Jun 15 13:32:50 2005